Best of #econtwitter - Week of December 13, 2020

Dec 14, 2020

Welcome readers old and new to this week’s edition of Best of Econtwitter. Thanks to those sharing suggestions, over email or on Twitter @just_economics.

Paper summaries

Lionel Page@page_eco

Study finds that the release of Facebook in a new language led to an increase in political protests in countries where the language is used. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf…

11:53 AM · Dec 10, 2020

47 Reposts · 163 Likes

Christopher A. Neilson@ChrisANeilson

They rounded up a bunch of high human capital people, sent them off to (maybe) nonrandom remote locations but in *random proportions* - then come back ~65 years later to find higher education, higher wages and more economic development 🔥 Don’t see papers like this everyday

Pierre-Louis Vézina @pl_vezina

Enemies of the people were the educated elite, targeted by the Soviet authorities for they posed a threat to the propaganda-dependent regime. Along with millions of other non-political criminals, they were sent to forced labor camps scattered across the Soviet Union, the Gulag. https://t.co/fo5lf7Zmvo

10:31 PM · Dec 12, 2020

99 Reposts · 285 Likes

Equitable Growth@equitablegrowth

"We document trends in new work, now we document trends in innovation." Bryan Seegmiller (@MITSloan) w/ @davidautor #EGgrantee #EG2021

7:22 PM · Dec 10, 2020

5 Likes

John B. Holbein@JohnHolbein1

Earnings penalties that come with mental illness: Depression: -34% $ BD: -38% $ Schizophrenia: -74% $ But, treatments for mental illness help eliminate a significant portion of these $$$ penalties. Evidence (from 🇩🇰): "Career Effects of Mental Health" barbarabiasi.com/uploads/1/0/1/…

8:54 PM · Dec 12, 2020

29 Reposts · 87 Likes

^see also: lit review on the causal relationship between (poverty) <-> (mental illness)

Lionel Page@page_eco

Do elite schools improve students' outcomes? Students who just make it in elite schools in Chicago do not have better results later on, relative to students who just miss out on entry. Those from disadvantaged backgrounds even get *worse* results. aeaweb.org/articles?id=10…

12:56 PM · Dec 13, 2020

69 Reposts · 241 Likes

^also commentary from Arpit Gupta here

Peter Hull@autoregress

Just posted a new (short!) working paper, with David Arnold (@UCSDEcon) and Will Dobbie (@Kennedy_School) It’s called “Measuring Racial Discrimination in Algorithms” bit.ly/37Sbhv4 Here's an (even shorter!) summary thread 👇

5:06 PM · Dec 9, 2020

81 Reposts · 251 Likes

Jeanne Commault@joj_como

Here’s a thread about my first paper (I discovered today this @AEAjournals tweet!). The topic is the estimation of the elasticity of consumption to transitory shocks.

AEA Journals @AEAjournals

Forthcoming in AEJ: Macroeconomics: "Does Consumption Respond to Transitory Shocks?" by Jeanne Commault. https://t.co/0Obg5geg0v

1:56 PM · Dec 9, 2020

36 Reposts · 256 Likes

John Paul Koning@jp_koning

New paper on payments anonymity: papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf… Anonymous digital cash provides consumers with a “bargaining tool.” Its mere existence may allow us to better negotiate compensation for the sharing of our data, in effect allowing us to monetize our (lack of) privacy.

3:16 PM · Dec 8, 2020

20 Reposts · 76 Likes

Dan Sacks@sacksdaniel

New paper! Blind Disclosure Did your school move to P/F grading in the spring? Did you think, “economic theory predicts all students should stick with a letter grade, I wonder if they will?” Then I have theory, evidence, and a thread for you 1/

2:51 PM · Dec 7, 2020

16 Reposts · 115 Likes

Bitsy Perlman@BitsyPerlman

The technology that produced the Moderna vaccine started being developed under NIH grants before being spun off into, as it was then capitalized, ModeRNA. NIH doesn't assert a rights to IP funded by its grants, they are open to be commercialized by others. A paper thread 👇👇

Dani Sandler @dhsandler

#CensusResearch in @nberpubs: The Color of Money: Federal vs. Industry Funding of University Research by Tania Babina, Alex Xi He, Sabrina T. Howell, Elisabeth Ruth Perlman (@BitsyPerlman) & Joseph Staudt (@josephstaudt) https://t.co/1bRkUjvHRR https://t.co/3CT10sGnEr

5:11 PM · Dec 7, 2020

11 Reposts · 28 Likes

Other paper threads: on private equity and IPOs; on corporate debt overhangs and recessions; on labor market flows; on computing OSP mechanisms;markups aren’t countercyclical?; JEL paper on local policy choice;

Public goods

Arnaud Dyevre@ArnaudDyevre

Some news I'm really excited about 🥳: with 30 other PhD students in Economics at LSE, we have launched a mentoring programme for PhD applicants from underrepresented backgrounds. The programme is called AMP: lse.ac.uk/economics/stud…

lse.ac.uk

LSE Economics PhD Applicant Mentoring Programme

12:21 PM · Dec 7, 2020

279 Reposts · 1.31K Likes

Robert Suits@Robert_Suits

Today, one of my longest-running research projects is finally coming to fruition. It's a comprehensive inventory of U.S. energy use from 1800 to 2019. Play around with the animation at us.sankey.rdcep.org! #envhist #energy 1/x

RDCEP @RDCEPorg

Two centuries of energy transitions in one animated graphic: see how U.S. energy use has changed from 1800 to today using our interactive Sankey animation at https://t.co/fwmQtqCsgv. 1/x #EnergyTransition #EnergyPolicy https://t.co/PGvgHOMNXU

11:17 PM · Dec 8, 2020

158 Reposts · 467 Likes

Navel-gazing

Ben Golub@ben_golub

A polite, scathing, and comprehensive reply by @jasndoc and coauthors to the "ergodicity economics" of @ole_b_peters. @NaturePhysics erred in not finding a referee who would ask these basic questions of the authors, but glad a reply is out there. nature.com/articles/s4156… 1/

5:35 PM · Dec 13, 2020

92 Reposts · 424 Likes

^thread from one of the authors here

Social Finance, David Hirshleifer@4misceldah

1/ New paper by @camharvey and me on the editorial process in econ-related fields. We argue against the all-too-common practice of applying the Union Heuristic: requiring authors to perform all requested tests and extensions suggested by referees. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf…

5:55 AM · Dec 8, 2020

22 Reposts · 82 Likes

Dan Hirschman@asociologist

Between 1946 and 2016, economists testified before Congress more than 10,000 times, more than double the other major social sciences combined. journals.plos.org/plosone/articl…

9:23 PM · Dec 13, 2020

36 Reposts · 104 Likes

Nelson@Nelsonzegt

Which countries get too much attention in economic research relative to their GDP? Fun map by The Economist economist.com/graphic-detail…

1:15 PM · Dec 11, 2020

5 Reposts · 36 Likes

Paul Goldsmith-Pinkham@paulgp

This is what is known, I believe, as punching above one's weight: highereddatastories.com/2020/12/baccal…

7:55 PM · Dec 10, 2020

6 Reposts · 95 Likes

Job market papers

Matt Clancy@mattsclancy

Key findings: - Academic scientists spend less time analyzing data when there are more people working on the same protein (presumably, in order not to be scooped) - This is associated with measurably lower quality protein models

4:50 PM · Dec 10, 2020

1 Like

^summary of a paper from Carolyn Stein & Ryan Hill (and the thread has more)

Anna Stansbury@annastansbury

@stephaniedcheng looks at the gender gap in biological sciences academia. Bio is one of the most gender equal sciences at undergrad and grad level... The gap emerges for tenure track faculty for women w/ children as women move into jobs which require more standard working hours

4:01 PM · Dec 8, 2020

3 Likes

Anna Stansbury@annastansbury

@NinaRoussille investigates the "ask gap" in the online labor market Hired.com. She finds that women systematically ask for lower salaries than men, and this leads to a pay gap -- but that a small change in default on the platform can eliminate this pay gap entirely